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Ebook186 pages3 hours
Cycling's Strangest Tales: Extraordinary but true stories
By Iain Spragg
Rating: 3.5 out of 5 stars
3.5/5
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About this ebook
Welcome to the weird, wonderful and two-wheeled world of cycling. Though this isnt the usual side of professional cycling the newspapers report. This is the real world of cycling, the strange and twisted nooks and crannies of the sports bizarre history! Cycling is nearly two hundred years old. The velocipede invented by Baron Karl von Drais in 1817 started the craze for the two-wheeled machine that has had a renaissance few would have predicted. During those decades, bicycles have thrown up more than their fair share of extraordinary and bizarre stories. Iain Spragg has trawled the bicycle history books to give you the most fascinating collection of stories, from the first bicycle trip across the globe (an Englishman on a penny farthing in 1886, of course), the 1904 Tour de France winner who was disqualified when it emerged he had caught the train, the 1937 Japanese invasion of China spearheaded by 50,000 bicycle-mounted troops, and the Japanese enthusiast who stayed stationary on a bike for 5 and a half hours in 1965. With stories from amateur and professional cycling, this is a thoroughly entertaining collection of tales for any two-wheeled enthusiast.
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Reviews for Cycling's Strangest Tales
Rating: 3.5 out of 5 stars
3.5/5
2 ratings3 reviews
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5This book was very interesting. It was a really easy read and a fast read as well. I loved learning about all the mishaps, innovations and forward thinkers that helped to develop this rail system. Many of the stories made me thankful for the improvements in travelling via rail that we experience today. I think my most favourite story of all of them was the first one in the book. This story spoke about the man who started the building of the system. He ended up in debtors prison for a bit and whilst there he watched a ship worm make a burrow through the wall in his cell. The way this humble worm did this was to secrete a slimy substance around the inside of the tunnel. This slimy substance hardened quickly at which point the worm would move onto the next section and repeat the whole process. This gave Brunel (the builder) the idea to design a huge cast-iron ring within which the workers would work totally protected. I found it fascinating how such a small animal lead to the building of the Thames Tunnel.
I would certainly recommend this book to anyone to read. - Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Ever since it opened in 1863, the London Underground has helped to transport billions of travelers all over Greater London. Iain Spagg’s London Underground’s Strangest Tales provides a chronological collection of tidbits, asides, and goofball stories to help tell a different story of the train line’s history. While many of the chapters are interesting, coincidental, or historical, they aren’t really strange. Don’t get me wrong, the information presented here is fun and useful for a lot of trivia contests (like, for instance, only two people has ever been transported on the Tube on their way to be buried: Prime Minister William Gladstone and philanthropist Thomas Barnado). The writing is jovial and breezy and you can whiz through this book in a few hours, but don’t expect to be regaled with tales of intrigue and sensationalism. A quick and fun book.
- Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5As a New Yorker who rode the subway every day for 25 years, I developed a love/hate relationship with it. I was curious to learn how Londoners feel about their Tube. London Underground’s Strangest Tales did not disappoint me. Stories ranged from the history of various stations to the role of the Underground during World War II’s London Blitz to urban legends to commuter quirks. I thoroughly enjoyed this book and recommend it to anyone who is interested in trains, London, and history. For added enjoyment, read it the subway, the loop, the T, the metro, or on your own town’s subway.